Ports of LA/Long Beach update Clean Air Action plan

In a unique regional act of cooperation, harbor commissioners from Los Angeles and Long Beach came together for a special joint session yesterday, approving a new version of the San Pedro Bay Ports Clean Air Action Plan (CAAP).

The 2010 CAAP Update builds upon the successes of the original which since being enacted in 2006 has initiated a wide range of air pollution-reducing measures for the vessels, trains, trucks, and other heavy machinery used to move approximately $300 billion worth of freight through the port complex each year.

The 2010 CAAP Update is part of the original pledge to ensure that the CAAP is a “living document” which will be adapted as needed to add new pollution-control measures. The 2010 CAAP Update sets even more aggressive goals for reducing air pollution and health risks from port operations.

According to Cindy Miscikowski, president of the Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners, the two ports are making the move at while they “modernize and redevelop facilities to accommodate business and job growth.”

The announcement comes at a time, however, when port stakeholders are questioning the zealotry of “green” factions who may be harming the competitive advantage West Coast ocean cargo gateways had for many years.

“The environmental process for California’s ports already is an exhaustive list of alphabet soup,” said T.L. Garrett, vice president, Pacific Merchant Shipping Association.
“CEQA, NEPA, EIR, EIS, HRA, CAA, CWA, EPA, CARB, DTST, NPDES, just to scratch the surface,” he added. “The result of this ever-increasing list has been environmental documents that used to be a few hundred pages are now thousands of pages - and project evaluations that used to take one-to-two years now seem to go on indefinitely.”